The Silver Dragon quest - not Deus Ex like?

[Mep_histo]

First of all, thanks for this great total conversion of a great game!

My question:
Quite early in the game you get this quest, and its outcame has irreversible consequences.
Problem is, solution one is kind of easy, solution two quite hard, since your fighting abilities are still very low, and weapons bad.
And there seems to be no alternative ways e.g. to trick the guards, or use stealth. So saving the dragon was a) hard and b) unsatisfying to me because of the mass killing. Are there different solutions to this? Thanks!

[JC_Helios]

Knock out the guards patrolling away from the rest of the guards(out of view). then knock out the guards furthest back, or out of view... like this:
> = facing
Length = position
G = Guard

>>>>>>>>>>G
>>>>>>>>>>G
>>>>>>>G
>>>>>>>>>>>>>G

in some of their positions there is at least one guard like Mr. G#3 that can be knocked out without the others noticing. as for the others you can still deal with them stealthily/nonlethal with:

tranq darts, gas grenades, tactical retreat, leading 1 or 2 to SD (if you don't count those on your conscious), or prodding them once each and then finishing em' off. (stun fist is a great help if you got it.)

The fact is there's not much that could be done due to his size... Just imagine if the subway hostages were giant dragons.... couldn't just open the door and tell them to run in.

[Jonas]

Incidentally it was deliberately designed to be easier to kill SD than save him to offset the fact that pretty much everybody wants to join PDX instead of WorldCorp. I guess the morale is that doing the right thing is often harder than being a total bastard

[MrBlack]

I considered it harder to kill SD.

Essentially the mission is either take out a group of low level guards, or kill one big mini-boss (let's face it, if you get flamed by him, unless you have an extinguisher you're toast).

Taking out the guards was easy, only two groups actually cover each other from prod attacks, and if you have a powerful pistol (AO's pistol for example) those two groups of guards aren't much of a problem

[JC_Helios]

I'm a bastard, I tell SD the path is clear and let him get slaughtered... or kill all but a few guards who weaken SD for me and then shoot him in the back of the head as he slowly walks off after being "saved."

[Jonas]

Either is a valid solution.

Other ways to kill SD:
A couple of double-gun blasts in simultaneous fire mode to the face should do it.
LAM - enough said.

[chrisssf]

Or DTS. I had DTS as soon as I could get out of downtown.

[AgentSmithereens]

Ok here's a neat little trick which allows you to do this section easily without alerting the guards. It all depends on the NPCs' Orders property - if their HomeTag is set to Start then this won't won't, if it's not set to anything then it will. Luckilly with the guards in the basement it's not set.

In DX (and hence TNM) if you have a non-interactive conversation with an NPC (eg JC / Trestkon doesn't say anything in return), and the NPC has a HomeTag of Start, if you move around whilst the NPC is speaking he'll turn to follow you. Then when he finishes, he'll revert back to his original position. Likewise if he doesn't have a HomeTag specified if you move around whilst talking to him, when he's finished speaking he'll still be faced where you last stood.

So in the basement in TNM you need the guards to be facing the opposite direction from each other so they can't see you knock out the other guards. So what you need to do is talk to them, run around them so they're facing the wall and wait for them to finish. Then knock out the guards they can't see, rinse and repeat. Unfortunately this only works for guards standing still, so you'll have to find your own way to deal with the few who are patrolling down there.

[Grunker]

^ Why would you want to play the game like that?

Just curious.

[AgentSmithereens]

He asked for a solution.
I gave one.

[Mep_histo]

I considered it harder to kill SD.

He gets shot when you tell him to follow you and you don't defend him, so that's easy.
I can understand the reason for making it harder to save the dragon. But in Deus Ex there was almost ever a way to avoid fighting, e.g. instead o killing Gunther finding and using his killphrase. In this case, perhaps distracting the guard in the guards' room and triggering am alarm elsewhere (so all the guards run there).

[Supahchikin]

Well heres how i did it:

I told SD to stay,i used the pistol i got from the guards in Phasmatis's apartment to headshot the WC guards,and then told SD that the coast is clear.

[Mep_histo]

Great plan, why haven't I thought of that?

[that guy]

Ok here's a neat little trick which allows you to do this section easily...

That is a funny trick. We should possibly set up those guards to use guard points

[Trafalgar]

When I played PDX I knocked out most of the guards with my hands (on advanced level), from behind, without the stun fists - took two chops. When both guards were facing away from me, and not looking at each other, they didn't notice it, and the one being knocked out didn't react in time to save his own butt either.

On the other hand, there were a couple places where that didn't work, and I didn't have tranqs. The rest I prodded or shot.

Killing SD was definitely easier, except that I died several times from being lit on fire before I succeeded. I had to run and shoot at the same time, which made my aim go to crap (I didn't want to just let the WC troops shoot him).